"I get a sense that the winds have changed," Bob Watada said. "I think these people are waking up to the fact that the war in Iraq is an invented war."

Among those supporting Watada was James Yee, a former Army captain and Muslim chaplain at Fort Lewis. He worked at the U.S. military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, but was arrested and accused of spying. All the charges against him were ultimately dropped.

"Ehren is an Asian American like myself, and he's dealing with the Fort Lewis chain of command," Yee said.

He added that he was drawn to Watada's case because of the free speech issues. Watada has spoken out against the war in Iraq.

Yee was critical of the war Wednesday night. "We have not handled it appropriately in regard to understanding Islam and Islamic culture. As a result, we trample the culture ... that helps the insurgency against the U.S."

There were a handful of counterprotesters Wednesday night outside Fort Lewis.

But members of Operation Support Our Troops, a group that has supported soldiers and their families with mass mailings of gift boxes and held flag-waving rallies, declined to join the counterprotest. Doing so would lend undue publicity, Nadine Gulit, a co-founder of the group, said.

The pro-Watada rally came in a week in which Watada's supporters announced intentions to turn up the heat on his behalf.

Watada's mother, Carolyn Ho of Hawaii, used a Web site created to keep her son's supporters informed -- www.thankyoult.org -- to invite others to come to Exit 119. She asked peace groups nationwide on Wednesday to conduct a "national day of education" with teach-ins about legal and moral issues surrounding the war in Iraq.

Meanwhile, in a friend-of-the-court brief, the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington announced this week that it is backing Watada's free speech rights to express legal and moral objections to the war in Iraq. The ACLU declined, however, to take a position on his challenge to the lawfulness of orders to report for deployment to Iraq.

"Soldiers should not be court-martialed for explaining their views on important political issues when doing so does not adversely affect military functioning. Lt. Watada was exercising his free speech rights as a citizen in a democratic society," Kathleen Taylor, the ACLU of Washington executive director, said in a statement.

Watada is the only known commissioned officer in the U.S. military to refuse to deploy to Iraq. He previously has served in Korea.

Watada is not a conscientious objector. Instead he believes the war in Iraq to be immoral and illegal under constitutional and international conventions. He has said he sees it as his duty as an officer to point out and refuse unlawful orders. He has said he would fight in Afghanistan.

The Army has declined his offers to allow him to resign.

Watada's civilian lawyer, Eric Seitz of Hawaii, has said Watada's case raises key issues about the legality of the war in the face of international war conventions, and the scope of the president's constitutional authority. Seitz hopes to introduce evidence about that, and says he wants to call expert witnesses in international law, including a former United Nations undersecretary, Denis Halliday, to support Watada's contentions.